Rosshalde Read online

  Pierre was awake when she entered his room in the morning. He wanted no breakfast but asked for a picture book. His mother went to get one. She wedged another pillow under his head, pushed aside the window curtains, and put the book into Pierre's hands; it was open to a picture he was especially fond of, showing a large, gleaming, golden-yellow Lady Sun.

  He lifted the book to his face, the bright joyful morning light fell on the page. But instantly a dark shadow of pain and disappointment crossed his sensitive face.

  "Ugh, it hurts!" he cried out in torment and let the book drop.

  She caught it and held it up to his eyes again. "But it's Lady Sun whom you love so dearly," she pleaded.

  He held his hands before his eyes. "No, take it away. It's so disgustingly yellow!"

  With a sigh she removed the book. What could be the matter with the child! She knew his moods and sensibilities, but he had never been like this.

  "I have an idea," she said hopefully. "Suppose I bring you a lovely cup of tea and you can put sugar in it and have a nice piece of zwieback to go with it."

  "I don't want it!"

  "Just try. It will do you good, you'll see."

  He gave her a tortured, furious look. "But I don't want it!"

  She left the room and stayed away for some time. He blinked at the light, it seemed unusually glaring and hurt him. He turned away. Was there never again to be any comfort, any bit of pleasure, any little joy for him? Whimpering, he buried his face in his pillow and bit angrily into the soft, insipid-tasting linen. This was a remote echo of his earliest childhood. When as a very little boy he had been put to bed and sleep did not come quickly, it had been his habit to bite into his pillow and to chew it rhythmically until he grew tired and fell asleep. Now he did so again and slowly worked himself into a silent stupor that made him feel better. Then he lay still.

  His mother came back an hour later. She bent over him and said: "Well now, is Pierre going to be a good boy again? You were very naughty before and Mama was sad."

  In former times this had been strong medicine which he seldom resisted. As she said the words now, she was almost afraid he would take them too much to heart and burst into tears. But he seemed to pay no attention, and when she asked him with a note of severity: "You do know you were naughty before?" his lip curled almost scornfully and he looked at her with utter indifference.

  Just then the doctor arrived.

  "Has he vomited again? No? Fine. And he's had a good night? What did he have for breakfast?"

  When he raised the child in his bed and turned his face toward the window, Pierre winced with pain and closed his eyes. The doctor was struck by the intense look of revulsion and misery in the child's face.

  "Is he also sensitive to sounds?" he asked Frau Adele in a whisper.

  "Yes," she said softly. "We can't play the piano any more, it was driving him to despair."

  The doctor nodded and half closed the curtains. Then he lifted the child out of bed, listened to his heart, and tapped the ligaments under his kneecaps with a little hammer.

  "That will do," he said in a friendly tone. "We won't bother you any more, my boy."

  He carefully put him back into bed, took his hand, and smiled at him.

  "May I drop in on you for a moment?" he asked Frau Veraguth with a note of gallantry, and she led him into her sitting room.

  "Now tell me a little more about your boy," he said encouragingly. "It seems to me that he's very nervous; we shall have to take good care of him for a while, you and I. His upset stomach is nothing. He must absolutely start eating again. Good things that will build up his strength: eggs, bouillon, fresh cream. Try him on egg yolks. If he prefers them sweet, beat them up in a cup with sugar. And now tell me, have you noticed anything else?"

  Alarmed and yet reassured by his friendly, confident tone, she reported. Most of all she had been frightened by Pierre's indifference, it was as though he didn't love anyone any more. It was all the same to him whether one spoke kindly to him or scolded him. She told the doctor about the picture book and he nodded.

  "Give him his way," he said, rising. "He's sick and for the moment he can't help behaving badly. Let him rest as much as possible. If he has a headache, you can put on cold compresses. And in the evening let him bathe as long as possible in lukewarm water, that will make him sleep."

  He took his leave and would not let her see him down the stairs. "Make sure that he eats something today," he said as he was going.

  Down below, he passed through the open kitchen door and asked for Veraguth's servant.

  "Call Robert over," the cook ordered the maid. "He must be in the studio."

  "Never mind," said the doctor. "I'll go over myself. No, don't bother, I know the way."

  He left the kitchen with a quip. Then suddenly grave and thoughtful, he walked slowly down the path under the chestnut trees.

  Frau Veraguth thought over every word the doctor had said and she could not quite make up her mind. Apparently he took Pierre's illness more seriously than before, but he had actually said nothing alarming, and he had been so calm and matter-of-fact it was hard to think there was any serious danger. It seemed to be a state of weakness and nervousness that would pass with patience and good care.

  She went to the music room and locked the piano for fear that Albert might forget himself and start playing. And she wondered to which room she might move the piano if this should go on for a long time.

  Every few minutes she went to see how Pierre was, opened his door cautiously and listened to see if he was sleeping or moaning. Each time he was lying awake, looking apathetically straight ahead, and sadly she went away. She would rather have cared for him in danger and pain than see him lying there so closed in, so gloomy and indifferent; it seemed to her that the two of them were separated by a strange dream space, a dreadful, powerful barrier that her love and care were unable to break through. A treacherous, hateful enemy lay in ambush; his nature and evil purposes were unknown to her and she had no weapons against him. Perhaps the child was coming down with scarlet fever or some other children's disease.

  Troubled, she rested awhile in her room. A bunch of spiraea struck her eye. She bent over the round mahogany table, the red-brown wood shone deep and warm under the openwork cloth. She closed her eyes and buried her face in the soft summery blossoms, whose sweet pungent smell, when she breathed it deeply, had a strangely bitter undertone.

  As she straightened up, slightly stupefied, and let her eyes roam idly over the flowers, the table, the room, a wave of bitter sadness rose up in her. Her mind grown suddenly alert, she looked about the room and along the walls, and all at once the carpet, the table with the flowers on it, the clock, and the pictures looked strange and unrelated to one another; she saw the carpet rolled up, the pictures packed, and everything loaded into a van that would carry all these objects, now without home or soul, away to a new, unknown, indifferent place. She saw Rosshalde standing empty with closed doors and windows, and she felt forsakenness and the sadness of parting staring at her from the flower beds of the garden.

  Only for a few moments at a time. The feeling came and went like a low but urgent cry from the darkness, like a briefly projected fragmentary image of the future. And the thought rose clearly to her consciousness from the blind realm of the emotions that she would soon be homeless with her Albert and with little sick Pierre, her husband would leave her, and the bleak forlorn coldness of the loveless years would lie on her soul forever. She would live for her children, but she would never again find the beautiful life of her own which she had hoped Veraguth would give her and the secret claim to which she had continued to treasure and cherish until yesterday and today. For that it was too late. And her disenchanted knowledge chilled her heart.

  But her robust nature rose at once to the defensive. Days of anxiety and uncertainty lay ahead of her, Pierre was sick, and Albert's vacation would soon be at an end. It wouldn't do, it just wouldn't do for her to weaken now and listen to subterr
anean voices. First Pierre must be well again and Albert back at school and Veraguth in India, then she would see, then there would still be plenty of time to rebel against her fate and cry her eyes out. Now it was pointless, she mustn't, it was out of the question.

  She put the vase of spiraea out on the windowsill. She went to her bedroom, poured cologne on her handkerchief and wiped her forehead, examined her careful severe coiffure in the mirror, and went with calm, measured steps to the kitchen to make Pierre something to eat.

  Then she went to the child's room, sat him up straight, disregarded his gestures of protest, and carefully and unsmilingly fed him the egg yolk. She wiped his mouth, kissed him on the forehead, smoothed his bed, and told him to be a good child now and go to sleep.

  When Albert came home from a walk, she led him out to the veranda, where the taut brown-and-white-striped awnings were flapping in the summer breeze.

  "The doctor has been here again," she told him. "He says there's something wrong with Pierre's nerves and he must have as much quiet as possible. I'm sorry for your sake, but for the present there can't be any piano playing in the house. I know it's hard for you, my boy. Perhaps it would be a good idea for you to go away for a few days while the weather is good, to the mountains or to Munich? Papa would certainly have no objection."

  "Thank you, Mama, you're very kind. Maybe I'll go off for a day, but no more. You'd have no one to stay with you while Pierre is in bed. And besides, I ought to start on my schoolwork, I've been loafing up to now. If only Pierre gets well soon!"

  "That's a good boy, Albert. It's really not an easy time for me, and I'm very glad to have you here. And you've been getting along better with Papa lately, haven't you?"

  "Oh yes, ever since he decided to go away. Besides, I see him so little. He paints all day. You know, sometimes I feel sorry that I've been nasty to him--oh, of course he has tortured me, but there's something about him that always impresses me. He's dreadfully onesided, he doesn't know much about music, but he is a great artist and he's got his life work. That's what impresses me so. He doesn't get anything out of his fame, and not much out of his money either: that's not what he works for."

  Frowning, he groped for words. But he was unable to express himself as he wished, although it was a very definite feeling. His mother smiled and stroked back his hair.

  "Shall we read French together again this evening?" she asked coaxingly.

  He nodded and then he too smiled. At that moment it struck her as unbelievably absurd that only a little while before she could have yearned for any better lot than to live for her sons.

  Chapter Fifteen

  SHORTLY BEFORE NOON, Robert went out to his master at the edge of the woods to help him carry home his painting materials. Veraguth had finished a new study, which he wished to carry himself. Now he knew exactly how the picture had to be and felt confident of mastering it in a few days.

  "We'll be coming out again tomorrow morning," he cried joyfully, blinking with tired eyes at the dazzling noonday world.

  Robert unbuttoned his jacket with deliberation and took a piece of paper from his inside pocket. It was a rather rumpled envelope with no address.

  "This is for you."

  "From whom?"

  "From the doctor. He came looking for you at ten o'clock, but I told him I couldn't call you away from your work."

  "You did well. And now forward march!"

  The servant went ahead with knapsack, camp chair, and easel. Veraguth stayed behind and, suspecting bad news, opened the envelope. It contained only the doctor's visiting card with a message scribbled hastily and none too legibly in pencil: "Please come to see me this afternoon, I should like to speak to you about Pierre. His indisposition is not as insignificant as I thought preferable to tell your wife. Don't torment yourself with useless worry until we have had a chance to talk."

  He fought down the terror that threatened to take his breath away, forced himself to keep calm, and read the note through again attentively. "Not as insignificant as I thought preferable to tell your wife!" That was the enemy. His wife was hardly the delicate, high-strung type that had to be shielded from every unpleasantness. In other words, it was bad, it was dangerous, Pierre might die. On the other hand, he spoke of an "indisposition"; that sounded so harmless. And then "useless worry"! No, it couldn't be as bad as all that. Something contagious perhaps, a children's disease. Perhaps the doctor wanted to isolate him, to put him in a hospital.

  He grew calmer as he thought it over. Slowly he made his way home, down the hill and through the hot fields. In any case, he would do as the doctor wished and not let his wife notice anything.

  But on his return he was seized with impatience. Without even taking time to put his picture away and wash, he ran to the manor house, leaned the wet painting against the wall in the stairwell, and quietly entered Pierre's room. His wife was there.

  He bent down over the boy and kissed his hair.

  "Good morning, Pierre. How are you feeling?"

  Pierre smiled feebly. An instant later, he began to sniff, his nostrils trembled, and he cried out: "No, no, go away! You smell so bad!"

  Veraguth stepped back obediently. "It's only turpentine, my boy. Papa hasn't washed yet because he was in a hurry to see you. Now I'll go and change and I'll be right back. All right?"

  He left the house, picking up the canvas on his way; the child's plaintive voice still rang in his ears.

  At table he asked what the doctor had said and was pleased to hear that Pierre had eaten and had not vomited again. Still, he felt agitated and uneasy and labored to keep up a conversation with Albert.

  After lunch he sat for half an hour with Pierre, who lay quiet except for rare moments when he clutched his forehead as in pain. With loving anxiety Veraguth observed his narrow mouth, which looked languid and slack, and the handsome bright forehead, which now bore a faint vertical crease, a sickly but softly childlike crease that would go away when Pierre was well again. And the child must get well--even though he would then suffer doubly to go away and leave him. He must live to grow in his bright, delicate, boyish beauty and breathe like a flower in the sun, even if his father had bidden him farewell and were never to see him again. He must get well and become a beautiful, radiant man in whom what was purest and most sensitive in his father lived on.

  As he sat by the child's bedside, Veraguth had a foreboding of all the bitterness he would have to taste before all this lay behind him. His lips quivered and his heart shrank away from the thorn, but deep beneath all his suffering and fear he felt his decision, hard and indestructible. There it was; pain and suffering could no longer shake it. But it still behooved him to live through this last phase, to sidestep no suffering, to drain the cup to the last drop, for in these last few days he had seen clearly that his road to life must lead through this dark gate. If he were cowardly now, if he fled and recoiled from suffering, he would be taking muck and poison with him when he left and would never attain the pure sacred freedom for which he yearned and for which he was willing to incur every torment.

  Well, first of all he must speak to the doctor. He stood up with an affectionate nod to Pierre, and left the room. The idea crossed his mind of letting Albert drive him in, and for the first time that summer he went to his room. He knocked firmly on the door.

  "Come in!"

  Albert sat by the window, reading. He jumped up in surprise and went toward his father.

  "I have a little favor to ask of you, Albert. Could you drive me to town?--Yes? That's fine. Then would you run down and help harness the horses, I'm rather in a hurry. Cigarette?"

  "Yes, thank you. I'll attend to the horses right away."

  Soon they were in the carriage. Albert sat on the box and drove. At a street corner in town, Veraguth bade him stop and took his leave with a few words of appreciation.

  "Thank you, Albert. You're doing very well, you've got these nags well in hand now. Well, goodbye, I'll be walking home later on."

  He strode
quickly down the hot city street. The doctor lived in a quiet, fashionable neighborhood. At that time of day there was hardly a soul abroad. A water wagon drove along sleepily; two little boys ran behind it, held their hands out into the light rain of the sprinkler and, laughing, splashed each other's overheated faces. From an open, ground-floor window, the sound of listless piano practicing could be heard. Veraguth had always felt a deep dislike of lifeless city streets, especially in the summer; they reminded him of his younger days, when he had lived in such streets in dismal cheap rooms, opening out onto hallways redolent of cooking and coffee, and offering a view of attic windows, carpet-beating racks, and ridiculously small gardens without charm.

  In the anteroom, amid large, gold-framed pictures and thick carpets, a discreet doctor-smell gathered him in and a young girl in a long, snow-white nurse's apron took his card. First she showed him into the waiting room, where several women and a young man sat quiet and subdued in plush armchairs, staring at magazines; then at his request she took him to another room, in which innumerable issues of a medical journal lay piled. He had scarcely had time to look around when the girl came back and led him to the doctor's office.

  There Veraguth sat in a large leather armchair, in an atmosphere of efficiency and glistening cleanliness. Facing him at the desk sat the doctor, a short man of dignified bearing; there was no sound in the high-ceilinged room except for the sharp rhythmic ticking of a shining little clock, all glass and brass.

  "Yes, my friend, I'm not very happy about your boy. Haven't you been struck for some time by certain abnormalities, headaches, fatigue, no desire to play, and so on? --Only very recently? And has he been so sensitive for very long? To noise and bright light? To smells? --I see. He disliked the smell of paint in your studio! Yes, that fits in."

  He asked a good many questions and Veraguth answered. Though slightly numb, he was anxiously attentive and felt a secret admiration for the doctor's considerately polite, flawlessly precise manner of speaking.

  Then the questions came slowly and singly, and at length there was a long pause, silence hovered in midair like a cloud, broken only by the sharp, high-pitched ticking of the pretty little clock.